The Future of Augmented Reality (?)

The movie below provides a view on the future of Augmented Reality. We are big fans of augmented reality here at digital urban but someone we dont quite see it as the future. There is something that simply does not feel right within the general day to day urban context:

We maybe wrong but waving your phone around simply does not feel like the future to us, hyper location based services linked to voice recognition system such as the emerging SIRI are perhaps more likely than an augmented reality future, at least in the short term…. (?)

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Author Bio

Andy is Professor of Digital Urban Systems at the Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis at University College London.

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I agree, augmented reality often just seems to be ‘cool’ rather than actually good enough to be useful. I’ve never seen a use for it that’s actually better than the alternative more traditional interfaces.

I just don’t quite see that waving my phone around is a step forward even if it uses image recgonition and AR overlays. AR is a good bang for the buck as its quite easy to develop and has a high wow factor. It just seems a bit lost in the everyday environment above and beyond the odd application such as hertiage.

The way AR is presented here is not only NOT a step forward, it’s a step backward actually. It just adds more complexity to simple processes (such as checking weather or bus timetables) for the sake of coolness. But coolness is always subject to fast inflation. Evantually people will search for things that are more efficient. Why to grab your phone and aim at buses if you can just have a look at the electronic sign next to the bus stop?

It might end up as a cool gadget for car dealers or something but can’t see a reason why people would use it for the very same information they can get through faster and lighter AR-free iphone apps.

Consider AR applications aside from a smart phone. What about military environments with AR embedded in a helmet that soldiers wear on an every day basis? This is more than a high wow factor, it would reduce casualties in the field.